The present invention relates generally to a receiving apparatus and method, a sending apparatus and method, recording medium, and a communication system and, more particularly, to a receiving apparatus and method, a sending apparatus and method, recording medium, and a communication system for sending or receiving electronic mail.
Today, systems for sending/receiving text-based data via networks for example, or so-called electronic mail systems are in wide use.
A receiving apparatus which receives electronic mail (hereafter also referred to simply as mail) displays the received mail in the form of text.
There may be a situation in which a sender of mail desires that its recipient take some action as a result of receiving the mail.
A problem, however, is that the action to be taken by the recipient of electronic mail as desired by the sender of mail may not always be taken.
For example, the action desired by the sender of mail is not taken unless its recipient reads the mail, correctly understands its contents, and takes the action accordingly.
Likewise, if the data is attached to electronic mail, the required action will not be taken unless the application program corresponding to the data has not been executed on the recipient side.
For example, if a confirmation of attending a party is sent in electronic mail, the sender expects the recipient to read the mail and return an answer whether or not to attend the party.
However, in the conventional technologies, for the sender to receive the answer from the recipient, the recipient must correctly understand the contents of the received electronic mail, check the schedule of the party, write whether or not the recipient will attend the party to the return mail, and return that mail to the sender.
However, there is no guarantee that the sender can always receive the return mail of attendance/absence from the recipient.
This problem may be circumvented by attaching mail with an application program for making the recipient return mail. In this case, the recipient must activate the application program.
If a game such as Othello is executed via electronic mail for example, the Othello board may be described with symbols “+” and “−” and pieces with black and white dot symbols to exchange boards and pieces in the form of text, thereby making moves of the game.
However, every time a new move is inserted, the alignment of these symbols is disordered, so that each player must correct the alignment in each move.
It may be also possible to describe the contents of a game screen in PowerPoint (trademark) (an application program by Microsoft Corporation) for example and send the generated file along with electronic mail. In this case, however, the recipient must activate the corresponding application program every time he receives the electronic mail. Therefore, unless the recipient has the corresponding application program, he cannot view the game screen.
Further, in the case of Othello for example, each player must determine whether a new move has been made in accordance with the rules of the game and turn over the piece on the basis of the new move, which sometimes causes an error.